School Messenger FAQ

Hot Springs School District uses the SchoolMessenger notification service to send important information to families through phone calls and text messages. Please refer to this page for commonly asked questions related to these communications.

How do I opt-in to receive text messages?

Ensure your Primary Contact Phone number provided to your school is a SMS text-capable device. If you need to change your Primary Contact Phone number to a SMS text-capable device, please contact your school to do so. [Note: It may take 24 hours or more for numbers to be updated/changed from the district SIS database.]

If we have an SMS text phone number for you on file AND you have not already opted-in by texting “Yes” to 68453, you should receive a text from Short Code 68453 requesting you to opt-in to continue receiving important informational text messages from your child’s school. Make sure to reply to this opt-in message with a "Y" (no quotes) to opt-in.

To continue receiving informational text messages from the school district reply with “YES”.
If you don’t reply, you will not receive any future texts from SchoolMessenger.

I opted in, but I'm not receiving texts?

Ensure that your school has changed your Primary Contact Phone number to your SMS text-capable device number and that you responded to the opt-in message. It may take 24 hours for this number to be active after being changed or added to the district’s system.

Send a text with the word “YES” from that specific device to 68453. You should receive an opt-in confirmation message from the service.

Confirm that your school has attempted to send a SchoolMessenger broadcast that includes a text message to your phone number.

How do I know if it worked?

After you text one of the key words to the short code the system will ALWAYS respond back with one of three messages:

Opt-in Response: You’re now registered with the SchoolMessenger notification service. Reply STOP to cancel, HELP for help. Msg&data rates may apply.3msgs/mo. schoolmessenger.com/tm

Opt-out Response: You’re unsubscribed from SchoolMessenger. No more messages will be sent. Reply Y to resubscribe or Help for help. Msg & data rates may apply schoolmessenger.com/tm

Help or Unknown Key Word Response: Reply Y to subscribe for aprox 3 msgs/mo.Text STOP to quit. For more information reply HELP.

Any other response – or no response – indicates the recipient should contact their wireless device provider to have SMS messaging/premium content enabled (see below for more details).

What does it mean if I texted “yes” to 68453 and I received some sort of error message back?

If you receive what appears to be an error message similar to one of the following it most likely means that short code text messaging is not enabled on your wireless subscription plan:

Service access denied

Message failed

Shortcode may have expired or shortcode texting may be blocked on your account

Does not participate

These replies DO NOT indicate that the wireless provider can’t receive messages from SchoolMessenger. Rather, they are an indication that the mobile device does not have short code SMS texting enabled for that number. This is sometimes disabled by default on company provided cell phones. To address this contact your wireless provider.

[Note: Providers sometimes use various names for this type of texting service (e.g. short code, SMS, premium, etc.). If you simply ask about text messaging, your carrier may assume you are referring to person-to-person. Therefore be very clear to refer to “short code” text messages. Most TV programs with a voting component use short code SMS messaging (e.g. American Idol, Dancing with the Stars, etc.). Using an example such as this can be a way to clarify the type of texting service you want to enable.]

Will I be charged for the text messages that I receive from SchoolMessenger?

SchoolMessenger does not charge recipients for the text messages that they receive or send to the short code; however, wireless providers may charge for individual text messages depending on the plan associated with the wireless device.